Estonia becomes 17th member of the euro zone

Estonia has become the 17th member of the eurozone - the first ex-Soviet state to adopt the EU single currency.

The changeover from the kroon to the euro started at midnight (2200 GMT) in the small Baltic nation of 1.3m people.
Despite market pressure on the eurozone and the Greek and Irish bail-outs this year, polls suggested most Estonians wanted the euro.
Prime Minister Andrus Ansip marked the event by withdrawing euros from a cashpoint.
"It is a small step for the eurozone and a big step for Estonia," he said, holding the euro notes.
For many Estonians, 20 years after breaking away from the Soviet Union, the euro is proof that they have fully arrived in the West, the BBC's Baltic region correspondent, Damien McGuinness, reports.
Estonia joined the EU in 2004 - one of eight former Communist countries that did so, including its Baltic neighbours Latvia and Lithuania.
Two other ex-Communist countries - Slovenia and Slovakia - are already in the eurozone.
Anxiety about prices Estonia's government says the euro will attract foreign investors because devaluation is then ruled out.
However, poorer Estonians fear that prices will be rounded up, and that food will become even more expensive. And the prospect of having to contribute to bail-outs of richer eurozone countries is hard to stomach, our correspondent reports.
In the past year Europe's debt crisis has hit Estonia severely. The tough cuts in state spending, necessary to join the eurozone, have pushed unemployment to more than 16%.
To avoid a last-minute rush, Estonians were able to swap kroons for euros commission-free from 1 December, the AFP news agency reports.
Kroons will be used in parallel with the euro for the first half of January. Banks will swap Estonians' kroons for euros until the end of 2011 and the central bank will carry on doing so indefinitely.
The kroon has been pegged to foreign currencies from the start, first to the deutschmark and, in 2002, to the euro.
The rate of 15.65 kroons to one euro has never changed.

Egypt bomb kills 17 at Alexandria Coptic church

At least 17 people have been killed at a church in the Egyptian city of Alexandria in an explosion blamed on a suicide bomber with foreign links.

At least 43 people were wounded in the attack. It happened as worshippers were leaving a new year's service at the al-Qidiseen church shortly after midnight.
Coptic Christians and Muslims clashed after the attack, but police moved in and used tear gas to restore order.
President Hosni Mubarak urged Egyptians to unite against "terrorism".
In a televised statement he blamed "foreign hands" for the bombing. "Wicked terrorists targeted the nation, Copts and Muslims," he said.
"It is a terrorist operation that is alien to us... We will all cut off the head of the snake, confront terrorism and defeat it."
Earlier, authorities said the attack was caused by a car bomb.
Foreign connection? So far no group has said it carried out the attack.

The al-Qaeda in Iraq group had recently threatened Christians in Egypt. It cited the case of two Egyptian Christian women who reportedly converted to Islam in order to divorce their husbands. The group said the women were being held against their will by the Coptic Church.
Christians in the Coptic Orthodox Church make up about 10% of Egypt's population, most of whom are Muslims.
After the explosion, angry Copts clashed with police and local Muslims, reportedly throwing stones and targeting a nearby mosque. Some cars were also set ablaze in the turmoil.
Protesters went into the mosque, throwing books out onto the street, the Associated Press news agency reported.
The mosque was also damaged by the bomb and the casualties included eight injured Muslims, the health ministry said.
A large contingent of police rushed to the scene and used tear gas to disperse the crowd.

He says relatives are being denied access to the victims' bodies at the morgue and it is not clear when they will be buried.

Sectarian tensions In recent months Copts have complained of discrimination, while some Muslims accuse churches of holding converts to Islam against their will, our correspondent reports.
The BBC's Arab affairs analyst Magdi Abdelhadi says the Alexandria bombing is likely to intensify the growing feeling among Christians in the Middle East that they are a community under attack.
The blast is deeply embarrassing for the Egyptian police who, despite having draconian powers, have proved repeatedly incapable of anticipating and thwarting such violence, he says.
The mayor of Alexandria, Gen Adel Labib, said on Egyptian TV that there had been recent threats of attacks on churches.
A local priest said the death toll from the blast would have been even higher had the explosion happened minutes later, after more people had left the service.
After the explosion, Christians were seen chanting beside a burnt-out car in front of the church: "We sacrifice our souls and blood for the Cross."
Alexandria, Egypt's second-largest city with a population of about four million, has seen sectarian violence in the past.
In 2006, there were days of clashes between Copts and Muslims after a Copt was stabbed to death during a knife attack on three of the city's churches.

Obama's New Year's resolution? Fix the economy

President Barack Obama has set his New Year's resolution high for 2011: repair the struggling US economy.
In his weekly radio and Internet address today, the vacationing president said recent data showed the economic recovery was gaining traction even as millions of Americans are still out of work.
"Our most important task now is to keep that recovery going," Obama said. "As president, that's my commitment to you: to do everything I can to make sure our economy is growing, creating jobs, and strengthening our middle class. That's my resolution for the coming year."
Unemployment of nearly 10 percent and dissatisfaction with Obama's efforts to spur an economic recovery from the worst recession in decades helped fuel Republican victories in congressional elections in November.
Republicans will control the House of Representatives next year and Democrats will have a smaller majority in the Senate, a new political reality that will affect Obama's ability to push through his policy priorities.
The president, who forged a deal with Republicans to extend Bush-era tax cuts in the waning days of 2010, sought to strike a bipartisan note in his address.
"In a few days, a new Congress will form, with one house controlled by Democrats, and one house controlled by Republicans - who now have a shared responsibility to move this country forward," he said.
"I'm willing to work with anyone of either party who's got a good idea and the commitment to see it through."
One area where Democrats and Republicans will be challenged to work together is on deficit and debt reduction.
Senator-elect Kelly Ayotte, a Republican from New Hampshire, said her party was ready to spearhead that effort.
"Congress must get serious about meaningful debt reduction," she said in the weekly Republican address.
"This isn't a Republican problem or a Democrat problem - it's an American problem that will require tough decision-making from both parties. Republicans are ready to lead that fight."